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Entering Infanteer into our Lexicon

The proper term is:

  • Total voters
    54
From an historical point of view, I had a fellow soldier refer to himself as an infanteer, long before women were allowed in the combat arms.  As a side note, "Musketeer" is used in English.  As for "Infanteer", its use seems to be localised in Canada, so therefore it would not end up as part of English, but english (note one has an upper case "E" where the other has a lower case "e").  So, though the term is understood by more than one party, it is not universally understood or used today.  As others have mentioned, languages evolve, so perhaps one day, "Infanteer" may be part of the English language.  I would argue that it instead is slang, dialect or jargon used only within Canada.
As for me, is someone asks what I do in the Army, I respond "I'm an Infantry Officer".  Kind of a cop out, I know, in terms of this poll.  Having said that, the PER refers to Infantry Officers as "INF 00180-01" and Infantry NCMs as "INFMN 00010-01", so, like it or not, if you are in the infantry and you are an NCM, you are indeed an "Infantryman", regardless of  your (or my) opinion.  Naturally, however, you can call yourself an infanteer all you want, so long as you understand that it is a colloquial  use of the language.

As for changing it to "Infantryman/Infantrywoman", what about the naval ranks of "Ordinary Seaman" "Able Seaman" "Leading Seaman" and "Master Seaman"?  Would they become "Ordinary Seaperson?"  /ducking/

(Side note: when I spell checked this post, "Infanteer" came up as a non-recognised word)
 
D'oh!

"D'oh" has been added to the Webster's Millennium Dictionary of English, the Macmillan Dictionary for Advanced Learners and the Oxford English Dictionary. It is defined as: "expressing frustration at the realization that things have turned out badly or not as planned, or that one has just said or done something foolish. Also (usu. mildly derogatory), implying that another person has said or done something foolish (cf. DUH int.)." The OED etymologizes the word as "popularized by" The Simpsons, but lists usages as early as 1945.

There may be hope for getting INFANTEER recognised afterall!

Thank you Wikipedia.

HH
 
JDB said:
What percentage of infanteers are women, and how does this compare to other trades in the army?

Women make up 50% of the Canadian population, 15% of CF personnel, 6.7% of PRes combat arms personnel, and 1.9% of reg force combat arms personnel.

No quota, just my opinion.
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Using statistics as some sort of justification for jobs is PC nonsense! Should all trades be 50% female? 10% Asian? etc. Maybe, using your logic, we should throw out little things like PT standards and just insert whatever warm body fills the required ethnic/sex category because we are a little short that week! ::)

As Michael said,"Infantryman, not infanteer!"
 
HollywoodHitman said:
D'oh!

"D'oh" has been added to the Webster's Millennium Dictionary of English, the Macmillan Dictionary for Advanced Learners and the Oxford English Dictionary. It is defined as: "expressing frustration at the realization that things have turned out badly or not as planned, or that one has just said or done something foolish. Also (usu. mildly derogatory), implying that another person has said or done something foolish (cf. DUH int.)." The OED etymologizes the word as "popularized by" The Simpsons, but lists usages as early as 1945.
There may be hope for getting INFANTEER recognised afterall!
Thank you Wikipedia.
HH
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That's my point exactly.  It may one day be part of the English Language, but as of today, it isn't. Words come and words go.  Consider the Rammstein song "Du Hast".  Sounds an awful lot like "thou hast", does it not?  Well, it does because that's how we used to talk, but don't anymore.  Still, "thou" and "hast" are still found in English dictionaries, though they are listed as archaic forms of currently used words of "you" and "have".
Infantryman Infanteer SOLDIER ;)
 
2 Cdo said:
Using statistics as some sort of justification for jobs is PC nonsense! Should all trades be 50% female? 10% Asian? etc. Maybe, using your logic, we should throw out little things like PT standards and just insert whatever warm body fills the required ethnic/sex category because we are a little short that week! ::)
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Maybe not 50%, but better than 1.9%. No need to lower PT standards because more women who can meet the current ones may apply. Besides, I was just arguing for the use of the term "infanteer," not something more drastic like changing PT standards. It's also more than just political correctness. With recruiting and retention problems, getting more women to join would help to alleviate these problems.
 
Not entirely sure why, but the term "infanteer" doesn't sit well with me.  It sounds, somehow, vaguely American (like "hooo-rah").  Now, I hasten to add that's not US-bashing!  I have the utmost respect for my US colleagues-in-arms, but their ways are not necessarily ours, particularly when it comes to things like the niceties of (non-doctrinal) terminology, heritage, tradition, etc.

Actually, this thread has made me realize I've fallen into the habit of referring to "infantry soldiers", and have been doing so for several years now.  I'm not sure why I started doing this, but at some point, it just seemed like the right term for the job, I guess.  So, for me, it's "infantry soldiers", even though it may not roll off the tongue as nicely as "infanteers".
 
Instead of rolling tongues, why not just refer to them as "infantry" or "soldiers" or "infantrymen"?
 
I don't know about it being localized as Canadian.  A quick Google search came up with 909 hits.  Lots of them do centre around Canada, but several are British and at least one Jamaican.  Its existence as a Canadian term doesn't rule it out from addition, though.  An indepth browse through the OED Canadian Edition will find several Canadianisms; something only getting more prevalent as we add u to more and more bisyllabic words.  I don't have the book on me, but the Editors' Association of Canada published a style guide years back saying that at one point the u was mandatory.  Imagine the errour of driving one's motour car without a seatbelt.  (Subject to recall here, been a few years since I read it).

After a short webcrawl, found an individual who dates himself as an infanteer back to '65 here.  The site was done in '00 but I'm enquiring about the title.  The site is New Zealandish.  I've also noticed news media using the term, including the Maple Leaf.  Does anyone know which style guide they use?  I may have my CP guide here, somewhere.

Infanteer seems to be an unofficial part of RSE.  I'm genuinely interested in determining its origin, whether a malapropism or slang or a true use of the word. 
 
von Garvin said:
Instead of rolling tongues, why not just refer to them as "infantry" or "soldiers" or "infantrymen"?
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I honestly don't know.  Just something I started at some point, and it's stuck.  Although I admit that I do use "soldiers" on occasion as well.
 
I've been using "infantry" for years, and that seems to be the least problem in getting people to understand what I'm talking about. If you need to be more specific, than you can add whatever term is necessary....mech, light, Sgt, female, officer..whatever.

dglad said:
......  So, for me, it's "infantry soldiers", even though it may not roll off the tongue as nicely as "infanteers".
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But that is just silly. Do you feel a need to differentiate the "infantry soldiers" from the "infantry poets" or "infantry cooks"? ;) While all infantry are soldiers, most soldiers are not infantry. While I often mean only the combat arms when I use the term "soldiers," even though I know I should mean everyone who is army....at the end of the day, there is infantry....and everyone who supports the infantry (ie - the rest of the CF)  >:D
 
Journeyman said:
I've been using "infantry" for years, and that seems to be the least problem in getting people to understand what I'm talking about. If you need to be more specific, than you can add whatever term is necessary....mech, light, Sgt, female, officer..whatever.

But that is just silly. Do you feel a need to differentiate the "infantry soldiers" from the "infantry poets" or "infantry cooks"? ;) While all infantry are soldiers, most soldiers are not infantry. While I often mean only the combat arms when I use the term "soldiers," even though I know I should mean everyone who is army....at the end of the day, there is infantry....and everyone who supports the infantry (ie - the rest of the CF)   >:D
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I rather like the idea of "infantry poets".

As I said, this is just what I've taken to saying.  It's become habit, and I'm too old and cranky to put a lot of effort into changing habits (well, at least changing ones that aren't illegal, immoral, fattening or some combination thereof  ;))  I'm also not going to put a lot of effort into justifying it.  So there you go.

And I'm still not a big fan of "infanteer", but I do admit it provides a nicely packaged word to name what it is we do.

 
Soon we won't be able to call females women. Personally I voted for infanteer, not because it's PC, but because I like the sound of it, and the poll choices were limited.

I'm an Ordinary Seaman now and it's never occurred to me that anyone will mistake me for a man because of my rank name.

As for infantrywoman or a non-gender specific title attracting more women to infantry/combat arms -  somehow I just don't see that happening. Because of the demanding physical nature of the job, it's probably not a top choice for young women.

Back in the 80's when one of my female friends became a brakeman and eventually a railway engineer it caused quite a stir amongst the set-in-their-ways male engineers. It was widely thought amongst them that they would soon be overrun by women in their profession. Here we are 25 years later and there are still very few female railway engineers. It's just not a profession that women flock to. I suspect soldiering is also one.
 
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